I've recently acquired a '99 wave that needed a little TLC, and discovered that the main block bracket on the rear crossbar is very loose due to the screws having backed out from the hex-head nuts inside the bar. I've tried applying upward force from beneath the screw head to get the hex nuts to bite, but they seem to be "seized up" to the shaft of the screw .. There's about an 1/8" of vertical play between the top of the screw head and the crossbar. I'm just not confident in the integrity of this bracket like this if it were under a nice load from the main. So, if you could imagine a nice tight main bracket on the rear crossbar, and back the screws out an 1/8", that's what I'm dealing with. Any advice will do ! heheh

I've recently acquired a '99 wave that needed a little TLC, and discovered that the main block bracket on the rear crossbar is very loose due to the screws having backed out from the hex-head nuts inside the bar. I've tried applying upward force from beneath the screw head to get the hex nuts to bite, but they seem to be "seized up" to the shaft of the screw .. There's about an 1/8" of vertical play between the top of the screw head and the crossbar. I'm just not confident in the integrity of this bracket like this if it were under a nice load from the main. So, if you could imagine a nice tight main bracket on the rear crossbar, and back the screws out an 1/8", that's what I'm dealing with. Any advice will do ! heheh

We don't use rivets anymore. They stretch and become loose. They then cause wear and corrosion issues. newer boats (for many years now) have screws with nuts inside the beam. At some point (again several / many years ago) we added an access hole on the bottom side of the beam for direct access for installation and tensioning. If you have a small cap below... that is it. If not, you can drill a hole.

After consulting with the local Wave gestapo, I zip-tied a wrench to the end of a broomstick, marked the length of insert and alignment with a marker, and managed to grab the frozen nuts and back out the old screws. I bought some SS 10/32 screws with NYLOK nuts and used the same process to secure the eyestrap back, nice and tight .. [ Also, I added some small washers to go between the nuts and inside of the crossbar for extra hold since the holes had "stretched" a bit from the flopping of the loose screws previously ]In the future I think I'll upgrade to a traveler kit, but this will suffice for now ! Thanks for the input guys ~